Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania named 2024 African Nations Championship hosts
According to the football body, the East African countries will host the biennial football showpiece between February 1st and 28th, 2025.
Despite automatic qualification for the tournament, the trio will participate in the qualifiers while the team achieving the best result in the CECAFA qualifiers will also advance to the final tournament.
Meanwhile, the qualifiers for CHAN will commence with the first round of qualifiers taking place between October 25th and 27th, 2024, while the reverse fixtures take place from November 1st to 13th, 2024.
The Second Round of the qualification series will be held between October 20th and 22nd and December 27th and 29th 2024.
“Zones WAFU A, WAFU B, UNAF, UNIFFAC, and COSAFA will each have three qualifying teams,” part of the statement from CAF website read.
“The CECAFA zone, which includes the three host countries, will receive an additional slot due to their automatic host qualification.
“As a result, the total number of teams qualifying for the final tournament will be increased to 19 teams.”
Nigeria’s best performance at CHAN remains a second-place finish at the 2018 edition. Having missed the last edition, veteran coach Samson Unuanel has advised the Nigeria Football Federation to put everything in place to avoid another blackout.
“It is good that CAF has announced three hosts, which is good for tourism and that will enable other countries to have a feel of what it means hosting a competition of this magnitude,” Unuanel told Flashscore.com.
“This is also a prompt call for the NFF to ensure that the coaches of this team is known on time so we can start preparations for the qualification early.
“We missed out on the last edition and it would be a massive setback for the country and as well as the Nigeria Professional Football League if this repeats itself.”
Interestingly, the East African countries were awarded the hosting rights for the 2027 Africa Cup of Nations – the first time three nations will join to host the continental competition.
It is the third time AFCON would have more than one host after Nigeria and Ghana in 2000, as well as Equatorial Guinea and Gabon in 2012.
Senegal are the reigning champions after defeating Algeria 5-4 on penalties after a goalless draw at the Nelson Mandela Stadium in Algiers.
